[Discuss] duchy system rework

[jesseball at cox.net]

>The "why not" is that you 've taken something that should be automatic and 
made it a manual process. Yet more pointless exercises for the user: "Uh oh, I 
have to log onto BattleMaster today and pay my taxes!" It's a rather 
meaningless manual exercise that automation can handle much better. As far as I can tell, there's no benefit whatsoever to making it a manual process. 

RESPONSE: You have made an assumption of my suggestion. I never mentioned manually dealing with anything beyond what you wish to change when you want to.

>You've lost me with this explanation. We're splitting each region up into mini- 
realms and making a whole slew of new positions which we acknowledge will be completely ineffectual, just we can make a bunch of meaningless titles? 

RESPONSE: It is an means to an end. The end being a much less limiting fealty system. The means being that these positions on low levels may be pointless, but there is little reason to make things inconsistent or rely on a game mechanic to make that judgment.

>Only to the point that the army sponsors let them be the realm's armies. If the 
sponsor staffs the army with people loyal to him, then it *is* his army. 

RESPONSE: As stated, that is not within his direct power. With the diplomatic system I am proposing keeping such an arbitrary military set up would be cause for enormous problems. 

>All the marshal needs is the ability to give the army orders. He's the only one 
that can do so. So long as the army members are willing to follow his orders, it 
is the sponsor's army. 

RESPONSE: No, it is the realms army. Neither the sponsor nor the martial have any direct power over the army. It is all based on the willingness to follow by its members and the cooperation of other lords assigning knights to it. The marshal running the army should run the army and not have to ask completely disconnected lords(who may be rivals) for management. 

>The question of who divides the spoils is a separate question, that really can't be addressed by just giving the spoilt to the person that sponsored the army. What if the sponsor is someone who can't hold a position, such as an 
infiltrator? Or if the sponsor is a region lord in a duchy that has no connection to that region? 

RESPONSE: I have mentioned before that armies should be region based, meaning the region lord is the sponcer. I have also mentioned that should a region lord conquers another region, it becomes his vassal one way or another. Technically, even if the liege did not have land he would still be his liege, though the means to enforce vassal-hood would certainly be lacking unless he had political weight.

>I think I've seen situations in almost all realms I am in where things could 
have easily gotten to this level, and probably would have, had the settings been available. It's not that the realm is falling apart, but that a couple lords are 
at odds with each other. 

RESPONSE: That is entirely likely. Personally, I think it is a good thing as far as the game is concerned. The deterant is the big bad king who will likely choose a side in order to maintain the 'king's peace.' Ideally I'd like to see this game allow options, even self-detrimental or foolish ones, and simply use the players on best interests as the limitation instead of a hard-coded brick wall. 

>Again, I'm not following you. I don't see how your statements lead to the 
conclusion that we'll have higher turnover. Other than perhaps you'll see people resigning in disgust over the idiocy of other people, and their complete lack of power to fix the situation. But that's really a *bad* thing, not a good thing. 
We don't want to alienate players, and make them feel powerless. 

RESPONSE: turnover would be achieved by:

Vassal title revoking: this already exists on a superficial level. But I can imagine a liege reconquering a vassal who is disloyal and replacing him with a less fettered system. 

Knightly coups against region lords.

Regional coups against overlords(other than the current system's realm rulers)

Conquering rival vassals and reinstating new lords for the conquered. 

There is a whole slew of ways.

>Under your system of each region having it's own army, your typical army size 
would scale down to 2, maybe three knights, max, with the exception of cities 
and rich townslands. You'd have a score of marshals each taking command of 
an army of one knight. "You line up on the left, I'll take the right, and we'll 
pretend to be in Delay and Wound formation!" Your system of "one region/one army" completely breaks down. You simply cannot have a functional army of two knights. It just doesn't scale at all. 

RESPONSE: I have already considered this problem as well as already proposing an inbuilt solution in the proposal. I mentioned that a marshal could pay homage to another marshal. (it must be mentioned that because all regions have a general, the two positions would be the same). What this means is the the armies converge, the troops of the inferior taking on the diplomatic state of the superior, commands of the lead marshal, as well as the warchest. The army could leave just the same, taking all tertiary armies that payed homage to it with it. 

>...And if you like Crusader Kings so much, go ahead and play it, because 
BattleMaster is not Crusader Kings, World of Warcraft, D&D, or any of 
the other dozen or so games people have tried to take the entire 
mechanics systems from and transplant into it. ...Do we need a new addition to the Generic Complaints library? "BattleMaster isn't enough like my other favourite game, X!  Turn it into X so that I can play X here *and* there!" 

RESPONSE:  lol, I was immediatly reminded of "This is America, and if you don't like it then you can get out!"

I knew I would run into this kind of conservatism. Truth is, Tom asked for ideas for a change. I gave one. If it is practical or not is relevant. If you like it or not is relevant. Whether someone came up with a realistic and somewhat historical representation of quasi-medieval politics before BM and whether or not that somehow taints the approach is moot point, to us at least(not necessarily Tom).  Beyond that, mentioning CS was to prove that is was practically possible and feasible, not to say "BM should be like CS!". 

I am not concerned with what BM is not, only with what it is, and what it could be. Even the most idiotic and morally objectionable person can still have a strike of unequaled morality and brilliance(Don't assume I am saying this is). 

I do admit Rob's practical complaints are entirely necessary in this case, otherwise a flawed first draft would remain. Whether you like it or not is also relevant to the discussion. Whether or not my intentions are to change BM into CS are quite irrelevant. Besides I don't think either is capable of turning into the other, nor would I want them to.


-- 
Unsubscribing and other list options:
http://news.battlemaster.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss